Digital Friendship & Ping Pong with Stalin

In the series premiere of Seinfeld, Jerry has issues with a “friend.” Jerry essentially wants to “dump” him, but isn’t sure how to end the friendship, as he explains to George:

“He lived three houses down from me when I grew up. He had a ping pong
table. We were friends. Should I suffer the rest of my life because I like to
play ping pong? I was ten! I would have been friends with Stalin if he had a
ping pong table!”

The situation escalates, and reaches a breaking point at Monk’s when Joel angrily berates the waitress. Finally, the confrontation:

“Listen, Joel…I don’t think we should see each other any more. This friendship: it’s not working.”

--Not working? What are you talking about?

“We’re just not…suited to be friends.”

--But how can you say that?

“Look, you’re a nice guy. It’s just…we don’t have anything in common.”

--Wa—well, what did I do? I want to know what I did.

“You didn’t do anything. It’s not you…it’s me. This is very difficult.”

18 years have passed since the episode aired. In that time, MySpace, Facebook, and digital communication have made it more difficult to “dump” friends, but easier to establish boundaries and expectations for the friendship.Text messaging can be used between close friends that may be busy at the time, unable to take the call, or wanting to exchange thoughts on a game in progress. But it’s also a handy device to keep real-time human interaction at arm’s length: a “buffer” between you and someone you don’t really feel like dealing with.

MySpace and Facebook can be a semi-entertaining way for friends, separated by distance, to maintain (artificial) contact. But it’s also a convenient dumping ground for half-friends. Digital communiqués become substitutes for meaningful exchanges. If you didn’t take a phone call or answer an email, you can slap a sentence fragment on that person’s profile a week later as a pseudo-apology. It’s easier to have imbalanced relationships with MySpace and Facebook as well. One person could have little to no interest in another, yet have them as a “friend” on a social networking site. These “half-friends” in turn take an unusual interest in the other person.

Seinfeld experiences this during his attempted breakup:

--Jerry, I don’t understand – how can you do this? You’re my best friend!

“I’ve never even been to your apartment.”

In the digital age, an easy solution for a surplus of friends is to corral them onto your MySpace or Facebook page. Many people’s “my friends” list reads like a Rolodex of contacts from the past five years: some people you genuinely like; others you just happened to bump into.It’s tougher to eliminate friends in the digital age. And while the Seinfeld episode may have aired before the Internet went mainstream, his concluding thoughts seem fitting here:

“I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s certain friends in your life,
where they’re just always your friends, and you have to accept it. You see
them—you don’t really want to see them. You don’t call them—they call you. You
don’t call back—they call again.

The only way to get through talking to people you don’t like or have anything in common with is to act like you’re hosting your own little talk show. This is what I do: you pretend there’s a little desk around you. There’s a little chair over there. And you interview them.

The only problem with this is that there’s no way to say ‘Hey. It’s been great havin’ you on the show. We’re out of time.”

Huggieville Relocates

Bob Huggins leaving K-State after just one season may be one of the funniest things I’ve ever heard.

It’s the athletic equivalent of serving your spouse with divorce papers in the middle of the honeymoon.

There are some Jayhawk backers that actually are troubled by the development. “It’s bad for the Big XII,” they cry.

Get over it.

All the talk in recent weeks about KU losing to the Bruins because the Big XII was a weak conference is just that: talk.

A supposedly weak conference had the national player of the year, two first team All-Americans and three teams in the Sweet 16. Regardless of the stature of the conference, the games you played in January and February make little difference when you go 14 for 33 on dunks and layups. KU lost because the shots didn’t fall, not because of a “weak” Big XII North.

That’s almost beside the point anyway.

K-State fans were quick to adopt a new sense of swagger this year. Huggy-bear promised to make their dreams a reality. Beating the Jayhawks was guaranteed.

Wildcat fans were living in Huggieville, which is like a 21st century hobo camp for a motley crew of one-and-done phenoms and shady timebombs given their third or fourth stab at success.
The Wildcat fans weren’t even that excited about the current year. “Just wait—“they would say with a smile, “two years or three years from now, we’ll be beating you guys regularly.”

How sweet it is, then, that the apple of Manhattan’s eye jets after just one season.

I thought it was interesting that the online community seemed to be ahead of the curve on breaking the news. Message boards were slammed with reports from sports fanatics with too much time on their hands, and details trickled in: the only reason he didn’t take the job six years ago was because of the president of West Virginia, who is now stepping down in a few weeks; the provost at K-State was trying to transfer to West Virginia as well; and, the kicker – some sleuthing at FlightTrack revealed that a private plane was heading from West Virginia to Manhattan, Kansas. Later that day, the online murmurs were confirmed around 2:20 central time as Bob Huggins made the announcement.

At the press conference, K-State’s distaste for Huggy Bear’s move was palpable. Maybe part of that had to do with the laughable buy-out Huggins had. West Virginia had to fork over just $100,000 for the rights to Huggins…compared to $2.5 million that Michigan paid for the rights to West Viriginia’s coach.

I could go on for days, but I’ll stop here…and drop this essay quicker than Huggy left K-State.
Actually, I’m going to scan ebay for a K-State “Welcome to Huggieville” shirt, or maybe one of those “blackout” shirts: there should be plenty that were only worn once.

If You Have to Ask, You'll Never Know

“It’s one thing to fly in and cover a news event and fly out. To understand the full context, you have to live in the community…There’s no nationally distributed heartland perspective.”
--Victoria Ekstrand, Asst. Professor of Journalism at Bowling Green State University

If you aren’t finding a satisfactory answer, maybe you’re asking the wrong question.
The notion that “there’s no nationally distributed heartland perspective” is patently absurd: that dated logic is about as useful as a card catalog.

Didn’t you get the memo? The World is Flat and the digital age has obliterated time and space.
What precisely is it that you’d like to know about us little ol’ “Midwesterners” anyway? (We’re downright flattered thatcha care enough to ask).

Turns out we’re not as shy as you might’ve imagined.

Of course, you can always get a decent bird’s eye view of the landscape by checking out the major regional newspapers.

But it’s not tough to dig a little deeper for some local flavor.

Want to know “what’s up with Missouri?” You can find out what’s poppin’ in Branson, if you’re interested. Curious about the latest in politics in the Ozarks? Gotcha covered. Missouri republicans have their own community site as well. Missouri Democrats? Local politics in the greater Kansas City area? Random thoughts on Missouri politics from a self-described “grassroots guy?” Check.

What are farmers from the heartland thinking?

And while we’re at it, What’s the Matter With Kansas? If you don’t want to take the time to read the whole book, you can always check out one writer’s thoughts on the whole “science, evolution, education, religion, politics and more” debate. Or check out what a grad student at KU is thinking.

If you want to know what’s going on in any Midwestern Podunk town, you can probably find it—sometimes in places like…“A Town Called Podunk.”

The days of wasting human bandwidth by pounding the pavement are over.

The days of leisurely immersing yourself in a pseudo-ethnographic study to learn the inner-workings of a group of people are over.

You can learn a surprising amount about anything without leaving your living room. You just have to know what you’re looking for, where to look, and the correct questions to ask.

It’s part and parcel of Journalism 2.0.

Spring Break!!!

“SPRING BREAK!!!”


You’ve gotta either yell it, or follow it up with a heartfelt “Wooooooo-Hooooooo!”
This has become a bit of an inside joke among a couple dozen friends of mine for the past several years. It began as a slightly irritated observation:

“You know those party clips that MTV shows with people dancing on the beach and crap?”

“Yeah.”

“Why does everyone yell “Spring Break” on those? I mean, seriously!--who really says that?! …And they do it *every* time, too.”

We determined that “Spring Break!” is actually a state of mind.

It should be used as a greeting—you have people over, and someone may swing the door open, and, struggling to carry in a fresh 12-pack, may shriek “Spring Break!” to announce their arrival instead of actually knocking or offering a more traditional salutation.

It’s a battle cry for scholastic brethren. It has a certain motivating appeal that is Lombardi-esque, and usually results in a roomful of raised glasses and broad smiles.
“Spring Break!” actually works best when it’s unexpected: the dead of winter, for example. It’s a cathartic iteration that spices up any occasion, if only momentarily.

The kids on the MTV clips may have been catering to the cameras, but they struck a common nerve. “Spring Break!” is living in the moment, surrounded by good friends and not caring what tomorrow may bring.

And, because March Madness is tipping off right now, “that’s all I’ve got to say about that.”

SPRING BREAK!

Newspapers in Flux

Financial State of the Newspaper Industry

There is a virtual consensus that the newspaper industry is in a state of decline. It isn’t that the business is no longer profitable; rather, profit margins are slowly receding as younger generations obtain their news online—and often free of charge. The situation is not unlike that faced by the music industry five years ago when illegal downloads threatened the traditional business model: Some companies will fall by the wayside, while the innovators and creative thinkers in other organizations will “roll with the punches” and adapt to the new model. The news organizations that will thrive in the new model will embrace evolution and view the “print versus online” situation as a “both / and” opportunity instead of an “either / or” conundrum. The problem is convincing the decision makers within news organizations (and/or investors) that changes must be made to ensure future profitability.

The American Journalism Review from March and April of this year featured several articles from experts in the field that were concerned with the future of the newspaper industry. Rem Rieder, Editor and Senior Vice President of AJR, summed things up nicely: “In recent years public ownership of newspapers has gotten more bad ink than Terrell Owens.” He discusses McClatchy buying the Star Tribune in Minneapolis in 1998 for $1.2 billion, and that eight years later it is “dumping its largest paper for less than half of what it paid for it.” He contends that “readers and advertisers [are] defecting to the Internet in droves,” which is certainly true, but he does not discuss the potential for newspapers to inhabit the medium.

As if on cue, the next article in AJR was about Robert Allbritton, underwriter for Politico.com. Allbritton started things off on a high note, by hiring Him VandeHei and John Harris from the Washington Post as editor in chief and executive editor of the publication. They have 19 writers and 11 editors, bringing experience from Time, USA Today, and other sources. The organization is far more than talented reporters, though: “Synergy is a big part of Allbritton’s formula…[He] has cut a deal to give his reporters and editors high-profile exposure with regular appearances on CBS. In addition to the Internet site, the Politico’s team will produce a daily television show for Webcast and potential syndication.” Allbritton plans to produce a newspaper three days a week while Congress is in session and hopes to “tap into a lucrative, only-in-Washington market of…government contractors and lobbyists.” Probably the most interesting note of interest is that Allbritton seems to understand the economics of the industry: “Publishing strictly on the Internet is ‘the future,’ he adds. ‘It’s not here yet.’” The message is simple: economic success requires an integrated approach.

That same thought guided Robert Kuttner’s piece in the March/April edition of Columbia Journalism Review, where he succinctly argues, “newspapers stay alive as hybrids.” Kuttner notes with a tinge of self-deprecating humor that he turned to a 22-year old “colleague…prodigy…I opened the conversation by inviting us to compare how we get our daily ration of information. I begin my day, I immodestly confessed, by reading four newspapers. What do you do? Ezra suppressed a smirk. I use about 150 or 200 RSS feeds and bookmarks, he explained.” Kuttner concludes that he was “feeling very last century.” Perhaps even more interesting is that in his interviews, he expected to encounter dread from newspaper editors regarding the online shift, but surprisingly found that virtually everyone was either “fine” with the shift, or—more often—enthusiastic about the potential. “It wasn’t very long ago that I and a lot of other people in the newsroom were worried about the competition from the Web, and its effect on journalism…we were wrong. The Web is not the distraction that we feared it would be, and all the feedback improves the journalism.” Kuttner then delves into the world of hyperlocalism, citing the pride of Lawrence, Rich Curley, and his work at the Lawrence Journal World, Naples Daily News, and other publications. He concludes his article much as I began mine: “As readers, we no longer have to make that either / or choice between newspapers and the wild Web. We can have both the authoritative daily newspaper to aggregate and certify, and the infinite medley of the Web—all of which puts the traditional press under salutary pressure to innovate and to excel.”

For the time being, however, it is always easier to prolong necessary change. Robert Picard argues in the Winter 2006 Nieman Reports that newspapers “Tend to engage in short-term planning rather than developing longer-term strategic visions and promoting company development. Investors pressure them for short-term returns more than they do other types of companies that are able to articulate a vision of a sustainable future.” He believes that the problem is that many newspapers need to develop a new strategy for attracting readers and investors: “Forward thinking requires newspaper companies to rethink their roles as creators and purveyors of information.” In short, he argues that each newspaper must consider “who they are, what they are, and how they serve readers.” It seems simple, but can be a daunting task—particularly if it requires reorganization of the company; the danger of course is that a company may not realize a substantial economic return quickly enough to retain its investors.

In that same edition of Nieman Reports, Chris Cobler passionately argues that the industry he loves is in a “death spiral,” and changes must be made to survive. He argues that newsrooms need to be aligned in such a way that accepts the online reality, and trains reporters to work in a multimedia setting. He too sees it as a matter of attitude: “The Harvard Business School professors, among others, advise that we can view this change as a threat or an opportunity.” He sees the path ahead as one of great change that entails “looking for new partners and being willing to collaborate far outside of our comfort zone. And it means knowing that we have to cannibalize our print edition rather than grudgingly having it happen because of a corporate dictate.”

The newspaper industry has finally encountered a challenge to its monopoly on the dissemination of information. Some companies greet this reality while others ignore it at their own peril. News organizations have a balancing act between the online future and the present demands of investors seeking short-term returns. Allbritton’s synergistic model should provide an excellent blueprint to find what works. In the end, the risk-averse newspapers need to take the plunge. As Charles Bukowski reminds us in “Roll the Dice,” “If you’re going to try, go all the way.”



Works Cited

Cobler, Chris. “Risk-Adverse Newspapers Won’t Cross the Digital Divide.” Nieman Reports. Winter 2006. Accessed online at http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/reports/06-4NRwinter/p08-0604-cobler.html

Kiely, Kathy. “Politico Mojo.” American Journalism Review. February/March 2007, p. 10-11.

Kuttner, Robert. “The Race: Newspapers can Make it to a Bright Print-Digital Future After All—But Only if They Run Fast and Dodge Wall Street.” Columbia Journalism Review. March/April 2007, p. 24-32.

Picard, Robert G. “Capital Crisis in the Profitable Newspaper Industry.” Nieman Reports. Winter 2006. Accessed online at http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/reports/06-4NRwinter/p10-0604-picard.html

Rieder, Rem. “The Conventional Wisdom Trap: When it Comes to Newspaper Ownership, Saviors are Elusive.” American Journalism Review. February/March 2007, p. 4.